The X Factor by Ivan Sivec - Spotlight and Giveaway

This post is part of a virtual book tour organized by Goddess Fish Promotions. Ivan will be awarding a free e-copy of the X Factor or a signed greeting card from Slovenia (international) to a randomly drawn winner via rafflecopter during the tour. Click the tour banner to see the other stops on the tour.

*****FREE DOWNLOAD ON AMAZON!!*****

It takes three mistakes to be swallowed up and spat out by the fashion industry.
You trust the wrong people.
You think you know everything there is to know about life.
You abuse drugs.

The almost 18-year-old Maja is a regular high-school kid, who at the threshold of adulthood thinks she knows everything there is to know about life. As she enters the world of fashion modelling she gets completely enchanted.

However, the more her career thrives she’s less able to see the danger lurking around fashion industry. Maja starts falling in a downward spiral of drug addiction and is torn between the tempting dream of becoming a world famous model and the horrendous thought of destroying her body beyond the point of no salvation.

At a yacht party Maja gets drugged, assaulted and tossed overboard. She’s found the next day. Barely alive. Only a shade of her former self, in a gray space between life and death, she realises the fashion industry sucked everything out of her – except one thing – the will to live. Maja wants to be her old self again.

Ironically, it means losing the only thing that made her special. She has to give up on her hidden X Factor.

The X Factor:
Confession of a Naïve Fashion Model
is a psychological YA novel showing the glamorous fashion world behind its less glamorous scenes.

Enjoy an excerpt:

The window scene.

It was like a scene from a film about the escape of prisoners. They tied four sheets together to form a rope and climbed down onto the pavement, one by one. It was easy, just as if they were shooting a commercial. Downstairs, they hugged, as if they had just saved each other’s lives.

“And now what?”

“Nothing’s open right now and we won’t make it far on foot.”

There was a bakery on the other side of the street. Every day they rushed past, as they were tempted by the wonderful smell coming out of it. They were too afraid they would give in to temptation.

“We’ll break in to the shop, end of discussion!” Maja was overcome by a divine power. “As soon as we get our first salary, we’ll pay the owner back everything, including a large tip. I’m sure he’ll be understanding.”

“But is there even any bread in there?”

“There must be! Old bread and bread rolls stay in the bakery until the morning, when the farmers from the suburbs pick them up. They must use them for pig fodder. I’ve watched them from our window many times.”


The bakery wasn’t built very solidly. They took out an old window, easily entered and rushed to the shelves.

“Wow, that’s a lot of bread!”

“Oh, I’m so happy!”

Sitting on the floor in the middle of the room they stuffed themselves with old bread rolls until their stomachs became blown up as if they were pregnant.

“Well, I won’t die after all!”

“I won’t die either!”

Feeling blissfully satisfied, knowing they were full, they fell asleep from exhaustion and all the bad things that happened to them.


The owner found them half lying, half sitting, surrounded by old bread rolls.

“Mamma mia, mamma mia! What’s the world coming to?” he said, wringing his hands.

“They’re wearing the most expensive clothes in the world, but they would have died of hunger if they hadn’t stolen some bread!” He carefully woke them up and said with an understanding tone:

“Don’t be afraid, I won’t report you to the police. I’ve been observing you for a long time now. You’re as thin as rakes! Are you even women still?! I wouldn’t like to have such a woman for anything in the world. Oh, mamma mia, mamma mia, what’s the world coming to, what’s the world coming to…!”

They swore that when they get rich they would repay him for all the damage and add a prize on top.

“The biggest prize for me would be if you would buy some bread rolls each evening and start living a normal life.”


But despite the fact they were full, they couldn’t work that day. They were too full. They were so sick they vomited everything out, every last bite. They were too weak to even leave their beds. That was their first day without work. It was their own fault.

“A final warning before expulsion,” the director Monica let them know. “There are at least a hundred girls waiting in line who are serious about work. One more mistake like that and you’re out!”

16.3.2008 Ljubljana, Slovenija. Ivan Sivec, slovenski pisatelj.FOTO:JURE ERŽEN/Delo

About the Author: Ivan Sivec is a writer, poet and publicist from Slovenia, Europe. People say he is ‘a man with a hundred stories’ and he has been sharing them with his audience, both young and mature, for over four decades now. He is listed under the top five Slovenian bestselling authors.

In his rich and thriving career he has written in many genres. As a poet he has written more than 2,500 lyrics for ethnic and entertaining music for which he received several awards. His broad prosaic ‘repertoire’ includes biographies, historical, psychological and adventure novels, travelogues, youth book series, picture books as well as humorous stories. To this date he published over 130 books and is considered to be one of the most popular Slovenian authors.

His particular interest goes to psychological novels on issues teenagers face today, especially topics like suicide, drug addiction, adoption, AIDS... He shares true stories to let the young reader know they’re not alone.

Sivec devotes his free time to his wife of 44 years, their two children and three grandchildren. Since his retirement a decade ago he enjoys his days hiking the Alpine peaks (he is especially proud to have conquered the tallest mountain in Europe, the French Mont Blanc (4,810 m/ 15,771 ft), together with his daughter-in-law Tina). When he is not gathering inspiration from the mountains he is soaking in the tranquility of the Mediterranean Sea with his wife. Nature is his source of creativity. It allows Ivan to gather his thoughts and pour them onto paper.

Website: http://ivan.sivec.net/en/
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/ivan.sivec.en or http://www.facebook.com/the.X.factor.the.book
Twitter: https://twitter.com/Ivan_Sivec
Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/ISivec

Buy the book at Amazon, Kobo, or Barnes and Noble.FREE ON AMAZON TODAY

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A Beginner's Guide to Invading Earth by Gerhard Gehrke - Guest Blog and Giveaway

This post is part of a virtual book tour organized by Goddess Fish Promotions. Gerhard Gehrke will be awarding a $10 Amazon/BN GC to a randomly drawn winner via rafflecopter during the tour. Click on the tour banner to see the other stops on the tour.

Five Things You Might Not Know About Gerhard Gehrke

1) I love telling people that I used to work for the FBI. While building up my client list for my business I took on a janitorial account that included the local FBI field office. This meant getting finger-printed and having to clean their office while being supervised. It also meant that I got to know some of the agents and got a window into their world, which mostly consisted of tons of paperwork and lots of shredding. But I also got to see evidence from at-large bank robbers (bikes mostly) and hear stories about the embassy bombing investigations in Dar-es-Salaam. And one of the agents told me that he got into trouble for plinking pigeons in [a local city] with a .22 rifle while on duty.

2) I missed part of kindergarten and first grade. We were moving around (when young, obviously) between the United States and West Germany, and by the time we were in a situation where we could enroll in schools we moved back to the USA. This explains certain key gaps in my education. As an added bonus my later elementary school teachers convinced my parents that a home should be single language, so they stuck to English and my German skills atrophied. But I still have problems with spelling anything with “ie” or “ei” in English as the pronunciation is often inverted from German.

3) I love bugs, snakes, and find most creepy crawly things fascinating. When my wife and I go hiking we enjoy finding and photographing these, along with birds and more popular wildlife. This becomes a springboard for learning more about what we find, as I enjoy identifying our finds and learning about them. Did you know pillbugs breath through a mechanism similar to gills and that they can drink out of their anus? And if they're blue or purple, they're sick. But as a kid we would collect them and drown them in what my sister and I called nature soup.

4) We adopted two cockatiels from various sources. This is like taking on a child which will stick around for up to thirty years. The second bird was given to us by a friend who kept it in a mostly dark room for seven years. We are busily trying to socialize it and are having good success. It eats my almonds at my desk while I write. Meanwhile, the first one sits on my foot sleeping. My posture while writing is horrible as I juggle ornery birds that squawk, squabble, and chew mouse and keyboard cords.

5) File this under either oversharing or confessions. I was a bad influence on at least one high school friend. Brenda (name changed for reasons etc.) loved to drive fast and I encouraged her to speed through this underground parking lot that was flooded and slam the breaks so we could hydroplane across the water's surface. The first run was perfect and maybe too much fun. When we went again, we slid into a concrete pillar and smashed her car's front end. I gave her the story to tell her dad that we were avoiding a dog on the road. She told him, and he believed her. I consider this my first successful story submission. The next day her dad had her take him to the spot where we “almost hit the dog and had the accident.” By luck she picked a light pole that had a big enough scrape that might have been her car. We also both almost put each others' eyes out on different occasions, and she fell onto a broken wine bottle when we found out she should never drink alcohol. Now I'm feeling guilty again.

What would you do if you found a dead alien on a lonely highway?

Was it an accident, sabotage, or murder? And why is everyone blaming Jeff?

The extraterrestrials aren’t waiting for answers. They want revenge. And Jeff isn’t ready for company.

His only hope is an outcast mechanic from another world and a woman who might do anything to get off planet, including selling out her own kind. Jeff has to get to the bottom of why there are so many alien bodies piling up and who is really responsible.

A science fiction adventure novel, A Beginner’s Guide to Invading Earth tells the story of a reclusive ex-computer programmer who is the unwitting central figure of a plot to keep humanity from ever making first contact.

Enjoy an excerpt:

First contact with the humans wasn’t going as planned, as was obvious by the rank smells that choked the air of the alien visitorsʹ craft. But no one called them aliens where they came from.

Seven little Greys, short bipeds with large heads and big eyes and delicate limbs, sat in the flight seats of their ship’s crew compartments and listened as the Mission Commander lectured them from the Command Module. The harangue lingered in the air, not as words or even sounds but as a smell, a ripe one replete with pheromones and scent packets that the Greys used to speak with one another. A new string of curses from the Commander’s glands smelled of licorice. The Mission Commander composed itself. It wiped sticky sweat from its hairless frontal lobe.

The lights and displays in front of the seven crewmembers blinked and flashed. No one would so much as touch a button until the Commander was finished addressing the crew.

“I’ll hear no more of it,” the Commander said. “We’re on the human world. We go forward. Probability calculations for success show at 100%. The computer will be trusted.”

About the Author: Gerhard Gehrke studied film at San Francisco State University. He wrote and produced several shows for community television. His Science Fiction, Fantasy, and Horror short stories have appeared in several publications, including an Editor’s Choice-winning short story at AnotheRealm.com. A Beginner’s Guide to Invading Earth is his first novel.

You can connect with him at GerhardGehrke.com.

Twitter: https://twitter.com/gerhardgehrke
Facebook: www.facebook.com/gerhardgehrkeauthor
Blog: www.capriciousnarrator.wordpress.com/
Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=a+beginner%27s+guide+to+invading+earth+
Barnes and Noble: http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/a-beginners-guide-to-invading-earth-gerhard-gehrke/1122581957
Also available on iBooks
Link to YouTube Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xwExDzGD6Js

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Naked Choke by Vanessa Vale - Spotlight and Giveaway

This post is part of a virtual book tour organized by Goddess Fish Promotions. Vanessa will be awarding a ebook copy of Naked Choke to a randomly drawn winner via rafflecopter during the tour. Click on the tour banner to see the other stops on the tour.

Trapped at the bar during her best friend's engagement party, Emory finds herself with Mr. Dud and his obnoxious pick-up lines. That is, until sexy Grayson Green steps in to rescue her. She's been out of the game so long that she's practically a dating virgin. With her son off to college and her husband now an ex, Emory is learning how to be not a wife, not a mom, but a single woman. What she doesn't anticipate is falling—hard and fast—for a dominate, alpha male.

Grayson Green's an MMA champion, used to working hard and playing harder. He spent years in the limelight where fast times and fast women were easy to come by. Women just want to screw him and men want to be friends with the infamous Green Machine. The appeal is gone and he steps out of the ring to make some changes and get control of his life. He runs his own gym and is a trainer for the next champ. All the training in the world can't save him from the one-two punch of meeting Emory. She's different. She has no idea who he is...and she wants him anyway. She's everything he never knew he ever wanted and he's going to do whatever it takes to keep her.

Gray convinces Emory that there are no games with him, that he wants to take care of her, protect her, and pleasure her until she can't see straight. But not everything from his past are championship belts and sponsorship deals. He'll have to protect her from the one thing he can't control. Gray will do anything to keep Emory because he knows that winning in the cage is nothing compared to winning her heart.

Enjoy an excerpt:

“Sorry I’m late, baby. This place is so crowded, Paul pointed me in your direction.” I felt a hand on my shoulder before I realized the voice was talking to me. The surprise contact made me jump, but it didn’t feel creepy and gross like Bob/Bill’s hand had. It felt like…electricity crackling in the air before a thunderstorm. Glancing back, it was Mr. Bond’s brother—that would make him Mr. Bond as well, then?—smiling at me. At me! His brown eyes weren’t just dark, they were almost black and they were focused directly, completely, utterly on me.

About the Author: Vanessa Dare does it all: Urban contemporary to time traveling to Scotland and everything in between. Her bestselling alter ego, Vanessa Vale, sticks with steamy Wild West romps.

Facebook: Facebook
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/iamvanessavale
Join the author's mailing list: http://vanessavaleauthor.com/v/y

Buy the book at iBooks or Amazon.

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Hedon by Jason Werbeloff - Spotlight and Giveaway

This post is part of a virtual book tour organized by Goddess Fish Promotions. Jason will be awarding a $15 Amazon or B/N GC to a randomly drawn winner via rafflecopter during the tour. Click on the tour banner to see the other stops on the tour. Also, please note: for today ONLY the book is a free download!

What if happiness were compulsory?
What if your thoughts were not your own?
Plunge into HEDON for soul-twisting sci-fi.

In 2051, the Bhutanese Empire rules post-apocalyptic Shangri with iron-fisted Buddhist compassion. Happiness is compulsory, but making everyone happy isn’t easy in an overpopulated world. Breeders are ghettoed, homosexuality is mandatory, and Shangrians’ happiness levels are strictly monitored by hedometers implanted in their heads. Become depressed, or feel too happy without helping others feel the same, and The Tax Man will get angry. Very angry.

Gemini and Cyan, winners of the pregnancy lottery, are on the run. Cyan can’t fall pregnant, and Gemini is addicted to the Experience Machine. Will they evade The Tax Man, and find a way to end the brutal pleasures of Shangri?

The lovechild of Brave New World and The Handmaid’s Tale, HEDON is gritty satire on a dystopia drunk with bigotry and positive thinking.

“A one of a kind dystopian novel.”
“As politically depraved as anyone could desire.”
“This is storytelling at its best”.
– ReadersFavorite.com 5 star review of HEDON

Enjoy an excerpt:

The day before his father died, Gemini had carried the old, old man to the summit of the district heap. Cardboard boxes, plastic packets, clothes hangers, rags, and a thousand other remnants of the past had sagged, crunched and scratched beneath Gemini’s bare feet. By the time he’d reached the top, he was out of breath. But it wasn’t the weight of his father in his arms, clinging to his neck. His father weighed less than a memory. No, it was the thought that this would be the last time they would share the view together.

The heap was higher than the ghetto Wall, higher than the Devas. From the top, they could see it all. Rows and rows, and rows, of tin shacks stretched behind them. And before them, a mile away, was the great Wall, brown as the earth. Beyond was the city, its brown-white spires shrouded in fog. Brown fog.

His father had looked at Gemini then. Really looked. Looked at him, his son, not as a war veteran. Not as someone from the past. “Boy,” his father’s voice was hollow, soaked up by the heap, “are you happy?”

The breath in Gemini had caught. Of course he was happy. Everyone was happy. It was Shangri. But his lips formed a different reply. “No,” he said, and stared out beyond the Wall. His cheeks burned.

“That’s okay, boy. They say they’re happy. But they’re not. Nobody is.”

Gemini swung his head to study his father’s eyes. The blasphemy. Sure, there was unrest here, in the ghetto. Sure, there was discontent. But few spoke such … such blatant heresy. Such negativity.

“Find a girl,” his father said, placing a veined hand on his son’s. “Be happy with her, but not too much. Never forget …” His head twitched. “Never forget that there is more.”

His father fell silent. Gemini scooped together a pillow of detritus so the dying man could lie comfortably as he stared out at the city. The city the old man had fought for, and lost.

About the Author:

Human. Male. From an obscure planet in the Milky Way Galaxy. Sci-fi novelist with a PhD in philosophy. Likes chocolates, Labradors, and zombies (not necessarily in that order). Werbeloff spends his days constructing thought experiments, while trying to muster enough guilt to go to the gym.

He's written two novels, Hedon and The Solace Pill, and the short story anthology, Obsidian Worlds. His books will make your brain hurt. And you'll come back for more.

Amazon Author Page: http://smarturl.it/AuthWerbeloff
Newsletter sign up: http://smarturl.it/werbeloff
Goodreads: http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/7340789
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/solaceseries
Twitter: https://twitter.com/JasonWerbeloff
Website: http://www.jasonwerbeloff.com/

Buy the book at Amazon.

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Relentless by Vanessa Dare - Spotlight and Giveaway

This post is part of a virtual book tour organized by Goddess Fish Promotions. Vanessa Dare will be awarding an ebook of Relentless (international) to a randomly drawn winner via rafflecopter during the tour. Click on the tour banner to see the other stops on the tour.

A fun weekend at a friend’s wedding in Denver takes a bizarre twist for Anna Scott when her rental car is pulled over due to an “anonymous tip.” In her trunk…a dead man linked to warring crime families in Denver and New York. It should be easy for an innocent woman to be cleared for an simple mix-up. But was it a mistake? The police aren’t so sure, and neither is the crime boss who wants vengeance for his son-in-law’s death. Suddenly appearing on the radar means that now Anna Scott is in real trouble. Two years ago, Anna Scott didn’t exist. The police think she knows way too much about criminal procedures and they’re determined to find out her secret. Their attention forces Anna to play a deadly game of cat and mouse with both the mafia and the police. This twist of fate could not only expose her, but place her, and anyone close to her in jeopardy.

Jake Griffin is playing a deadly game. He’s spent the last few months undercover in the Moretti crime family. The mysterious and beautiful Anna Scott is a big problem. Moretti assigns him to find out who she is and what she’s after, and to kill her if she becomes a problem. Jake needs to focus on taking down Moretti, not risking his life and career protecting a sexy woman who is a complete mystery. Unfortunately, he can’t stop wondering about her. He knows she’s lying, but his gut instincts, and the bone deep desire he feels every time he sees her, won’t allow him to walk away. He discovers that he’s willing to go to war with the whole world for one alluring, yet vulnerable woman. He can’t seem to stop taking desperate gambles where she’s concerned. The most dangerous of all might be trusting her with the truth.

Enjoy an excerpt:

I still couldn’t tell Anna I was a cop. She’d be pissed—understatement of the year—and probably run off and take on that new identity. At the moment, it was critical I made connections with the likes of Frank Carmichael and I couldn’t do that if I was a cop. He wouldn’t take a meeting from me then if I held up the last corned beef sandwich on the planet.

“You dragged me over here on a Sunday morning to talk about my dates?” Carrie wanted to know.

“You have more than one?”

I wanted her to line them all up so I could check them out. Carrie might be thirty-two years old, but it didn’t mean I wouldn’t shoot any asshole who treated her poorly.

“Save your alpha personality for Anna,” Carrie grumbled, letting her head fall back against the couch cushion.

Anna just arched a brow and her gaze flicked down my body. Just a look like that had me getting hard, which wasn’t good in front of my sister. Alpha with Anna was definitely working—for both of us.

To hide my eagerness for Anna, I walked to the kitchen to get a drink. My dick was running the show now and I needed that to stop. It wasn’t going to see any action until I saved Anna, so I needed to get my brain in gear and focus on the dangerous shit. “I need you to set up a meeting for me with Uncle Frank,” I called out.

Carrie sat up. I couldn’t see her, but I knew this because her feet hit the floor. “Why would you want me to do that?”

“Because he’s going to help me kill Anna.”

About the Author:Vanessa Dare does it all: Urban contemporary to time traveling to Scotland and everything in between. Her bestselling alter ego, Vanessa Vale, sticks with steamy Wild West romps.

Email: vanessavaleauthor@gmail.com
Web: http://www.vanessavaleauthor.com
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/vanessavaleauthor
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/iamvanessavale
Amazon Author page: http://www.amazon.com/Vanessa-Dare/e/B016YKNBYG

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BOB by Tegon Maus - Excerpt and Giveaway

This post is part of a virtual book tour organized by Goddess Fish Promotions. Tegon will be awarding a $25 Amazon or B/N GC to a randomly drawn winner via rafflecopter during the tour. Click on the tour banner to see the other stops on the tour.

After 27 years as a newspaper man, Peter Anderson’s career is slipping away, at least it was, until he stumbled upon the story of a lifetime. Sent to do a fluff piece about lights in the night sky over Arizona, he discovers far more than he ever expected when he comes upon a mysterious young woman held prisoner in a basement. After helping her to escape, she disappears before he can learn the truth about who she is or where she came from. His search for her leads him back to the lights in the sky and leaves him with more questions than answers. The only thing he knows for certain . . . the only thing he can count on are the two words offered repeatedly by his friend and guide . . . “IS BELT.”

Enjoy an excerpt:

"Shit," I breathed to myself. I hadn't expected this to be easy. It never had been in the past, but with Bob and Fred leading the way, we were screwed.

Fred scampered to his next position, waving us on to the rock he had just left behind when he felt the coast was clear.

It took us another fifteen minutes to cross the distance from where we first saw the house to physically touching the building.

I had to admit, my heart pounded hard in my chest, certain we were about to be caught as Fred pulled himself up to peer into a window.

"Clear," Fred whispered and we crept around the corner.

There were no cars, no trucks, no men with guns to be seen anywhere. Fred had hit it on the mark. For all outward appearances no one was home.

We continued to follow Fred as he made his way to a back door. Slowly, silently, he eased himself onto the porch kneeling before the door, slipping a hand into his shirt pocket.

Removing two small, shiny tools from its folds, he went to work on the knob.

Faster than I could say "is belt" Fred worked the lock, turning the knob. The door opened slightly.

We held a collective breath, waiting for the sound of an alarm.

"Clear," Fred whispered softly as he allowed the door to open fully. Crouched, almost on all fours, he scooted inside, closing the door behind him.

Unfathomable amounts of time seemed to slip by with each heartbeat as Bob and I stood outside in the dark and waited.

About the Author:

I was raised pretty much the same as everyone else... devoted mother, strict father and all the imaginary friends I could conjure. Not that I wasn't friendly, I just wasn't "people orientated". Maybe I lived in my head way more than I should have, maybe not. I liked machines more than people, at least I did until I met my wife.

The first thing I can remember writing was for her. For the life of me I can't remember what it was about... something about dust bunnies under the bed and monsters in my closet. It must have been pretty good because she married me shortly after that. I spent a good number of years after inventing games and prototypes for a variety of ideas before I got back to writing.

It wasn't a deliberate conscious thought, it was more of a stepping stone. My wife and I had joined a dream interpret group and we were encouraged to write down our dreams as they occurred. "Be as detailed as you can," we were told.

I was thrilled. If there is one thing I enjoy it's making people believe me and I like to exaggerate. Not a big exaggeration or an outright lie mine you, just a little step out of sync, just enough so you couldn't be sure if it were true or not. When I write, I always write with the effort of "it could happen" very much in mind and nothing, I guarantee you, nothing, makes me happier.

Buy the book at Amazon or Barnes and Noble.

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Jump Cut by Libby Fischer Hellmann - Spotlight and Giveaway

This post is part of a book blast to reveal the cover for Libby Fischer Hellmann"s newest release Jump Cut. Libby will be awarding a $50 Amazon or B/N GC to a randomly drawn winner via rafflecopter during the tour. Click on the tour banner to see the other stops on the tour.

Hired to produce a candyfloss profile of Chicago-based aviation giant, Delcroft, Ellie is dismayed when company VP Charlotte Hollander, the architect of a new anti-drone system for Delcroft, trashes the production and cancels the project. Ellie believes Hollander was spooked by shots of a specific man in the video footage. But when Ellie arranges to meet the man to find out why, he’s killed by a subway train.In the confusion, she finds a seemingly abandoned pack of cigarettes with a flash drive inside that belonged to the now dead man.

Ellie has the drive’s contents decrypted, but before long she discovers she’s under surveillance and thrown into the middle of a situation filled with drones, hacking, and Chinese spies that put her life and those she loves in mortal danger.

Enjoy an excerpt:

The sun winked off the frozen surface of Lake Michigan the next morning as I drove south to McCormick Place. During one of the most brutal Chicago winters in decades, the smudge of purple clouds tinged with pink and gold hinted that the fury of winter might—just might—have peaked. I parked in the overpriced lot, bought half a dozen cups of overpriced coffee, and carried them into the massive exhibit hall.

The crew was setting up lights and shades, and Mac was behind the camera framing shots. MacArthur J. Kendall III owns a production studio in Northbrook. He started out shooting sweet sixteens, bar mitzvahs, and weddings, but parlayed that into corporate videos. We’ve worked together for nearly twenty years, from the days of two-inch video, to one-inch, three-quarter, and now digital.

Mac’s name, salt-and-pepper hair, button-down shirts, and penny loafers scream WASP, but the nasty scar running down his left cheek saves him from total Episcopalian infamy. He tells people he was attacked by a Mexican drug lord and made me swear never to reveal it was from a car accident.

I went up to him. “What do you need me to do?”

“You have the shot list?”

I nodded and pulled it out of the canvas bag that doubles as my purse. We went over it. He gestured to the main area of the Delcroft booth, which featured a large projection screen with the company logo on both sides, and about twenty chairs arranged theater-style.

“What time’s the first presentation?”

Teresa Basso Gold, our client contact, had told us to be prepared for a series of short remarks by Delcroft executives touting the company’s latest innovations.

I checked my watch. Barely six thirty. “The doors don’t open until nine, and Teresa said not to expect anyone until ten. But you can get some establishing shots, if you want.”

“Sounds like a plan,” Mac said and strolled over to confer with the crew.

About the Author:Libby Fischer Hellmann left a career in broadcast news in Washington, DC and moved to Chicago 35 years ago, where she, naturally, began to write gritty crime fiction. Twelve novels and twenty short stories later, she claims they’ll take her out of the Windy City feet first. She has been nominated for many awards in the mystery and crime writing community and has even won a few. *

With the addition of Jump Cut in 2016, her novels include the now five-volume Ellie Foreman series, which she describes as a cross between “Desperate Housewives” and “24;” the hard-boiled 4-volume Georgia Davis PI series, and three stand-alone historical thrillers that Libby calls her “Revolution Trilogy.” Her latest release, The Incidental Spy, is a historical novella set during the early years of the Manhattan Project at the U of Chicago. Her short stories have been published in a dozen anthologies, the Saturday Evening Post, and Ed Gorman’s “25 Criminally Good Short Stories” collection.

* She has been a finalist twice for the Anthony, twice for Foreword Magazines Book of the Year, the Agatha, the Shamus, the Daphne and has won the Lovey multiple times.
Website: http://www.libbyhellmann.com/

Author of Compulsively Readable Thrillers

Facebook: facebook.com:authorlibbyfischerhellmann
Twitter: http://twitter.com/libbyhellmann
Google+: google.com:+libbyhellmann
BUY LINK:

The Incidental Spy, Sept. 2015: http://www.amazon.com/Incidental-Spy-Libby-Fischer-Hellmann/dp/1938733843/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1439437050&sr=1-1&keywords=the+incidental+spy+hellmann

Jump Cut, March 2016: http://www.amazon.com/Jump-Cut-Ellie-Foreman-Mystery/dp/1464205191/ref=sr_1_1?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1444748309&sr=8-1&keywords=Jump+Cut%2C+hellmann

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Athena's Secrets by Donna Del Oro - Guest Blog and Giveaway

This post is part of a virtual book tour organized by Goddess Fish Promotions. Donna Del Oro will be awarding a print copy of The Delphi Bloodline, Born to Sing, Scheming, or Dreaming in Los Angeles to a randomly drawn winner via rafflecopter during the tour. Click on the tour banner to see the other stops on the tour.

Behind ATHENA’S SECRETS and THE DELPHI BLOODLINE series: Exploring Your Own Psychic Abilities
By Donna Del Oro

Most of us have intuitive insights into situations and people. We get “gut reactions”, “vibes” or “feelings”. Often, we’re gratified, even surprised, when our gut reactions prove correct, and we spend a few minutes wondering why our guts are smarter than some people’s minds. Or why our guts can’t help us out more often. Like, which slot machine should I play? Which stocks should I buy? Is this man all he claims to be?

Clairvoyance is a skill that my heroine, Athena Butler, has in abundance. “Clairvoyance” comes from the French, meaning “clear seeing”. It refers to the power to see an event or image that appears in the past, present or future. This type of sight usually does not occur with our physical eyes but with our “inner eye”. Or, as Athena refers to it, using her higher mind to tap into the Flow. She is also adept at psychometry; she can touch an object belonging to someone and receive information about that person in the form of visions and/or auditory feedback.

The Flow, to her and others of the Delphi bloodline, is an unseen dimension of energy that encircles the planet and which contains the information and historical records of the human race from the dawn of man to the timeless future. It can be compared to a universal memory bank of the human mind and soul, or as the Hindus call it, the Akashic Records for all mankind. Like a repository of human energy and knowledge for all time, it exists on a level or dimension that cannot be measured by any of today’s instruments. Some physicists believe this dimension vibrates at a different rate than the energy given off by the material world. If string theory proves correct, these energy strings and their vibration might enable scientists and engineers to make it possible for all of us to access this dimension.

But for now and in more common language, we call it the “spiritual dimension”. As the modern-day descendants of a powerful bloodline, Athena and her mother have inherited the extraordinary abilities of this “inner eye” or “higher mind” that allows them to access this other, unseen dimension.

So how can the rest of us mortals, who are not heirs to the Delphi bloodline, develop our own clairvoyant abilities? There are numerous books on the subject and private institutes for psychic research can be found in the United States. Many of these institutes conduct workshops for those who want to develop their intuitive talents. There are ESP/psi labs in highly reputable academic institutions, also, such as Stanford Research Institute (SRI), Princeton and the University of Virginia. I took a weekend ESP workshop conducted by a Czech physicist who once worked for the Moscow Institute for Psychic Research. What I saw with my own eyes and experienced first-hand changed my life in several ways. I went in a total skeptic and came out, a believer.

The Department of Defense has recruited and trained members of the Stargate Program to be remote viewers (clairvoyants who can “see” specific targets such as foreign missile silos and drug-running ships). Make this topic YOUR special hobby and soon you’ll be “seeing” things more clearly. Study this phenomenon, take an ESP Workshop, read about the many people who claim to have various forms of ESP powers and challenge the skeptic in you. And don’t be surprised if your intuitive abilities, at the very least, expand beyond your wildest imagination.

I did, and I was. But not any longer.

Athena Butler, the twenty year-old descendant of an ancient bloodline of psychics, yearns to lead a normal life. She wants a career, a boyfriend, independence. Her clairvoyant powers, however, have taught her that people can be false and dangerous. Although warned to keep her gift a secret, she's recruited by law enforcement to help search for a serial killer and uncover a terrorist cell. Can Athena stay alive long enough to fulfill her dream?

Enjoy an excerpt:

Kas pointed at one of these gravel paths that led through a thicket of oak trees. He seemed to observe how Spartacus was glued to Athena’s side, his tongue flopping out happily, and his tail wagging excitedly.

“We’re pals,” she said.

Kas led her down the back terrace steps to the gravel path behind a row of shrubs surrounding the pool and patio. They’d have to cross twenty acres—about a half-mile, Kas said—to the family’s boat dock.

“I know,” she said, “Alex already took us out in the boat.”

Kas gazed at her with a speculative look. “Women like Alex. He’s the family charmer. Guess he stole your heart, too.”

“Hardly. I’ve grown wary of men who’re too charming.” Athena smiled, bent over and rubbed behind the German shepherd’s pointed black ears until he almost purred with pleasure. Kas looked surprised.

“He usually takes a long time to warm up to people.”

Athena scratched under the German shepherd’s long jaw. “Like his master, I suppose. We became friends yesterday during the ski boat ride. Spartacus told me a lot about you and how he feels about you. You’re his sun and moon, his alpha and omega. He showed me all the things you do together.”

Kas halted on the path. “You read my dog’s mind?”

She didn’t mean for her tone to be so defensive, but out it came. “Well, yeah. It’s what I do. I was holding him in the boat. He doesn’t think in words, of course, but the visual imagery and feelings were there.”

He shot her a crooked smile, then slapped a palm against his thigh, a signal for Spartacus to heel at his side. The dog looked over at his master, back at Athena, gave a whine, and reluctantly moved away from her.

He mock-growled at his dog, which caused Spartacus to perk up his ears. Something was going on with these two-legged humans but the dog didn’t know what.

“That’s for being a traitor, boy. Telling this girl our secrets.”

Athena grinned. “Don’t worry, he didn’t reveal secrets about any of your girlfriends. I don’t think Spartacus knows or cares about that.”

“C’mon, boy.” Kas beckoned as Spartacus rubbed his fur against his master’s leg.

“You’re something else, Athena,” he added, “You’re here three days, and already stealing my dog. But you don’t want Alex? Most women I see hate my dog but crush on Alex. You’re a strange one.”

She almost tripped. Somehow his words both pleased and stung her. “Strange, huh? Well, I don’t think I want to be friends with you after all.”

He snorted but kept on walking, leading her down the path. “No danger of that happening. I don’t make friends with tall, pretty blondes, especially if they have ESP.”

He thinks I’m pretty. That thought unsettled her more than she wanted to admit.

“Because of your mother’s precog dream? She saw you ending up with a tall blonde?”

“Maybe. She said the tall blonde would have the gifts of the ancient Greek priestesses. That kind of narrows it down, doesn’t it? But hell, no one tells me what my future’s going to be, not even my own mother.” He stopped and fixed his gaze on her face. “Anyway, by strange I meant unique, special. What you, your mother, my mother have—this bloodline of females is extraordinary. You need to be protected.” He looked away and continued walking. “Alex and I do what we can for Mom. We guard her secret. We don’t let the outside world exploit her. Your mother has her husband. I suppose you’ll have to find a protector, too.” Kas looked down at Spartacus, who was trotting alongside. Athena heard his implied message: Don’t expect me to be him.

“Yes,” she said, her chin up, “perhaps. Right now I can protect myself.”

About the Author:

Donna Del Oro lives in Northern California with her husband and three cats. She taught high school and community college English classes for 30+ years and is now happily retired. When not writing novels or reading voraciously, she travels and sings with the medal winning Sacramento Valley Chorus. Donna is a member of Capitol Crimes, the Sacramento chapter of Sisters in Crime in addition to the Valleyrose chapter of the RWA. She has judged RITA entries and does developmental editing on the side. Two of her novels, Operation Familia and Born To Sing, have won national and international awards. Follow clairvoyant artist Athena Butler in the next book in The Delphi Bloodline series: ATHENA’S QUEST. Website: http://www.donnadeloro.com Buy the book at Amazon or Barnes and Noble. a Rafflecopter giveaway

New Siqdor by Stephen J. Carter - Exclusive Excerpt and Giveaway

This post is part of a virtual book tour organized by Goddess Fish Promotions. Stephen will be awarding a $10 Amazon or B/N GC to a randomly drawn winner, and a Digital copy of New Siqdor from Amazon to another randomly drawn winner; both prizes via rafflecopter during the tour. Click on the tour banner to see the other stops on the tour.

The environmental stilling on the planet of Nebura escalates, threatening to advance even beyond the world-girding storm ring. Meanwhile, Levrok's plan to arm a resurgent Siqdori Empire with a tulvar arsenal nears completion, and his departure off-world is imminent. Two survivors' groups join forces as events spiral out of control.

"NEW SIQDOR" is the 2nd book in the “Zero Point Light” SF series, and delivers a thrill ride of untold mayhem, hair-raising escapes, space colonization gone awry, and a descent to the ocean floor and beyond!

Enjoy an exclusive excerpt:

Aleesha turned to Turok. “How did your hunt for hidden crystals go?”

“It didn’t,” he said.

She turned to Mick. “You still want to establish a base on Polarica?”

Mick nodded. “Sending a beacon really is our only shot at being rescued.”

“A virtual beacon, of sorts,” Franklin added. “The planetarium gave us the idea.”

Mick smiled. “It was entirely Franklin’s idea, and we’ve since built on it.”

“We can deploy a holofield satellite,” Franklin said. “Then we’d send out a digital signal that the satellite should transmit as an FTL beacon.”

Mick shrugged. “Even after deployment, it’s not a sure thing. Hopefully it’ll be intercepted.”

“But all of this is moot unless we get to Polarica. And that depends on finding crystals, doesn’t it?” Carmen said, ever the realist.

“That’s true, there are no crystals,” Turok said. “But we may have found an alternative.” He was grinning.

“Oh?” Mick smiled.

“A nuclear sub.”

“You can’t mean,” Carmen asked, “an old nuclear-powered sub?”

“The very same.” Turok had folded his arms.

“Tell us again about the crystals,” Carmen said, smiling.

Thomas emptied his cooled coffee into a soup bowl and poured himself a fresh cup. “There are no crystals, period. But Turok’s hybrid nuclear sub should serve our purpose.”

Mick laughed. “I’m bursting to know what a nuke sub is doing in Oceangate, but first – can you get it running?”

“Absolutely!” Turok said, beaming.

“The odds are good,” Thomas said, qualifying Turok’s enthusiasm.

“I hate to be a spoilsport –” Carmen began.

“No you don’t!” Turok laughed.

Carmen scowled. “Maybe we should keep looking for crystals? After all, isn’t all the power here in Watyra from crystals? There must be some way –”

“True, the power here is from crystals,” Thomas said. “But they’re also embedded in the landline stations. There’s no way to adapt those into portable crystals.”

“You’re sure?”

He nodded.

Mick turned to Turok. “You’re serious about this?”

“We found a pallet of arc components for its circulation reactor. It looks like we have everything we need.”

“We accessed the ship’s emergency power node and did a quick start-up test,” Thomas added. “All systems worked fine.”

“This is great,” Mick said as he sat back down. “We have to assume Rainer was right, that Polarica remains unaffected by the stilling, for now. That’s one reason to go. A second is to deploy this holobeacon.”

“Assuming we find a way to do it,” Thomas added.

“In the record there’s a facility near the Pole where it should be possible,” Mick said.

“It’s certainly worth a try,” Franklin added.

“Well, how soon do we need the sub up and running?” Turok asked.

“The sooner the better,” Mick said, glancing quickly at Carmen.

About the Author:

Stephen J Carter is a Canadian writer living in Chiang Mai, Thailand. He completed a PhD in Social and Political Thought at York University in Toronto in 1997. This led to an 8-year period of teaching at universities in South Korea, Taiwan, and Thailand. In 2006 he settled in northern Thailand, and began writing fiction full-time in 2007.

In his early years he made several short-term forays into film and video production while involved full-time in academia. Along the way he tried his hand at writing non-fiction in and out of academia, and 8 years ago finally committed full-time to writing fiction.

For Stephen there is something about this northern Thai city that makes it a perfect place to write. His preferred genres to date have been horror and science fiction. On the one hand, he sets his horror novels in Thailand because Thais have such vivid customs that touch the supernatural. On the other hand, disheartened by the cultural Marxism that dominates social discourse now in the West, he feels drawn to writing science fiction for the rational optimism over possible futures it affords. Approaching SF formerly as pure escapism, he finds in it now a source of hope and forward thinking that can be very inspiring.

Stephen looks forward to writing several more novels in his two current series, Zero Point Light and Z Inferno.

Amazon Author Page: http://www.amazon.com/Stephen-J-Carter/e/B00IUPJIP0
Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/872381.Stephen_J_Carter
Twitter: https://twitter.com/stephenscifi
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/stephenjcarterauthor?fref=nf
Website: http://www.stephenjcarter.com/

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In Time for You by Chris Karlsen - Spotlight and Giveaway

This post is part of a virtual book tour organized by Goddess Fish Promotions. Chris will be awarding a $15 Amazon or B/N GC to a randomly drawn winner via rafflecopter during the tour. Click on the tour banner to see the other stops on the tour.

While horseback riding in the English countryside, sisters, Electra and Emily Crippen find themselves trapped in a tear in time. Thrown back to 1357 England and caught by a local noble, they are in a place that is home but as frightening and unfamiliar as an alien world would be. With no idea how the tear in time came about, the one thing they do know is: they must stay together and stay near to where the event took place in hopes of discovering the way back to their modern life. That certain need to stay together is the first certainty taken from them when one sister is forced to remain in England and one is sent miles away to Wales by royal order.

There is one other hope for help the sisters don’t know exists. It’s Electra’s lover, Roger Marchand. A time traveler himself, he never told her of his past. When he realizes what has happened to the sisters, he enlists the help of a scientist friend to help him open the suspected passageway through time. Any effort to save Electra and Emily will likely cost him his life. This was the time Roger came from, a time when his country, France, was at war with England. If he is discovered on English soil while searching for the sisters, he will either be killed or taken prisoner of war. Any risk is worth saving the life of the woman he loves.

Enjoy an excerpt:

"Just ahead. I have a surprise set up," Roger said as he trotted toward Elysian Fields again.

He led them to an open field where the sunlight was bright and the ground flat. The cafe staff had laid everything out on a red and white checked tablecloth from the restaurant. A platter held cheeses and fruit arranged around chunks of the baguette. The champagne sat chilling in a silver bucket with two flutes at the side. He'd share a flute with Electra.

“Damn,” he muttered, they’d forgotten the flowers.

Everyone dismounted and tied the horses to an oak tree with low hanging branches.

"It's lovely. You are such a romantic," Electra said, kissing him on the cheek.

Emily gave him a sheepish look. "Tell the truth, Roger. You planned for this to be enjoyed by just the two of you. I'm the proverbial third wheel, aren't I?"

Only a lout with a complete lack of chivalry would answer truthfully. "Don't be silly. What man..." he tipped his head at her, "especially a Frenchman, wouldn't be delighted to have two charming ladies at his side?"

"You're sweet to say that," Emily said. "Is there some sort of all occasion book Frenchmen work out of that tells them what to say to women? If not, you should consider writing one. You'd make a fortune."

"Thank you—I think."

Electra turned to Emily. "Want to pick some flowers?"

Emily nodded.

Electra emptied a wicker basket that held honey and butter while Emily took the sharp meat knife from the platter. "We'll be back in a flash," Electra said.

"Where are you going?"

"We passed a blanket of wildflowers not far back. I thought we'd gather a bunch for our table."

"Where exactly is this spot that's not far back?" He asked, anxious to pour the champagne and his heart out and propose.

"By that granite outcropping."

Roger reached for the basket. "You can't go there. That's not Alex's land. It's part of the acreage he donated to Dr. Gordon's group."

Electra held tight to the basket. "So? It's not like Gordon is going to know we were there. What harm are we causing picking a few flowers? None."

"His knowing is not the point. It's the principle. You've no right to go traipsing about on his property without permission." This was a thorny issue for him. In her defense, Electra didn't know that. Over the years, Roger had had his share of trespassers and poachers on his land. He'd never have given poachers permission to cross his land, but the trespassers, had they asked, he'd have let cross.

"Since you're determined to do this, hurry up and get away from there," he told Electra. "I'll open the champagne and have a glass ready for you."

"We'll work double fast," Emily added and the two jogged off.

He'd opened the champagne and was in the process of pouring when Electra's panicked scream came from the spot near the outcropping.

"Roger!"

He dropped the bottle and ran.

Gone. Both sisters were gone. The basket with a handful of flowers inside lay on the ground.

"Electra," he called out. "Emily."

He ran in a widening spiral hoping to find them. When he didn't, he returned and checked the scattered patches where the flowers grew for a clue. He looked for any sign someone had come along and taken them by force. Perhaps one of Dr. Gordon's crew had hustled them back to the trailer that served as their lab. Perhaps they demanded an explanation for what the women were doing.

He was grasping at straws and knew it. Anyone of the Gordon group could clearly see the women were picking flowers. Taking them off to their camp was heavy-handed especially for a bunch of scientists. Nor were there any footprints other than those left by Electra and Emily's riding boots.

What the devil could've happened to them? People don't just vanish without a clue.

He climbed to the top of the outcropping called out again. Only the rustling of the breeze through the trees and the low roll of thunder from the storm miles away could be heard.

About the Author:

I was born and raised in Chicago. My father was a history professor and my mother was, and is, a voracious reader. I grew up with a love of history and books.

My parents also love traveling, a passion they passed onto me. I wanted to see the places I read about, see the land and monuments from the time periods that fascinated me. I’ve had the good fortune to travel extensively throughout Europe, the Near East, and North Africa.

I am a retired police detective. I spent twenty-five years in law enforcement with two different agencies. My desire to write came in my early teens. After I retired, I decided to pursue that dream. I write three different series. My paranormal romance series is called, Knights in Time. My romantic thriller series is Dangerous Waters. The newest is The Bloodstone Series. Each series has a different setting and some cross time periods, which I find fun to write.

I currently live in the Pacific Northwest with my husband and five wild and crazy rescue dogs.

Website: http://chriskarlsen.com/
Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/4822048.Chris_Karlsen
Twitter: https://twitter.com/AuthorCKarlsen
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/chriskarlsenwriter
Google+: https://plus.google.com/117369224297604815922/posts

PRE-ORDER THE BOOK FOR ONLY $0.99: http://www.amazon.com/Time-You-Knights-Book-ebook/dp/B019JKXR5G/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1450544230&sr=1-1&keywords=In+Time+For+You+by+Chris+Karlsen

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Shadows of the Highridge by Jay Swanson - Guest Blog and Giveaway

This post is part of a virtual book tour organized by Goddess Fish Promotions. Jay Swanson will be awarding a e-book of Shadows of the Highridge to a randomly drawn winner via rafflecopter during the tour. Click on the tour banner to see the other stops on the tour.

Five Things You Didn’t Know About Jay Swanson

I’m currently sitting in the American Airlines Admiral’s Club in Paris, which sounds about three times more glamorous than it is, but the free croissants and Bailey’s do kick it up a notch. Here are five things you might not know about me (and I’m going to pretend you had an idea who I was before you started reading):

ONE: I’ve Lost 35 Pounds in Just Under Four Months.

I plan to lose a little more (and who knows, maybe I did while I was in France), but the end goal was 40 pounds by the end of 2015. I run about 20 miles a week now and try to pretend like I can lift weights when no one is looking. What makes the weight loss even more surprising is if you know something else about me:

TWO: I Eat in Restaurants 95% of the Time

Again, not nearly as glamorous as it sounds (in fact, food and I are on an emotional break at the moment). Eating in restaurants makes losing weight a bit more of a challenge as you’re never really sure what exactly it is you’re putting in your mouth. You hope it’s actually food. How did I do it? I counted calories and did my best to stay hungry.

Why eat in restaurants all the time (why not)? The same reason I traveled so much over the last two years: Work. But day jobs are boring interview material so let’s move on to something more fun:

THREE: I’m a Lord in the UK, But I Wasn’t Born into My Title

I’ll just leave that one as is; feel free to ask in the comments.

FOUR: I’ve Lived in Eight Countries (give or take depending on how you define “lived”)

Personally I don’t count Italy, though they do know how to live. Between North America, Europe, and Africa, I’ve spread out a little. The reason behind all this jet-setting is still a bit of a mystery, even to me, but I’d blame a large portion of it on reading the entire TinTin series as soon as I could form sentences without mouthing them silently to myself. So, like three months ago (shut up, Steve).

Suffice it to say that when I was little I fell in love with France and just never let it go. I taught English there after college, and again in the middle of my stint with Mercy Ships – a volunteer operation running the world’s largest private charity hospital ship. It was with Mercy Ships that I lived in South, Central, and Western Sub-Saharan Africa; how I saw the world, but not how I saw the country.

FIVE: I Took a State-Side Travel Job to Fund Into the Nanten

I didn’t know what project I would launch myself into when I got back, but I knew that I would need money for my future as a writer. I’m just too into production to leave my projects to someone else. I did this for the same reason that I chose to remain independent for so long: creative control.

Into the Nanten, the world’s first real-time fantasy blog, was born of a combination of my desire to reach a new audience, tell an episodic story, and process my experiences abroad (in a much more cannibal-infested manner). After a successful round at Kickstarter, I was able to launch a second season of Into the Nanten in September and a spinoff novel on Halloween: Shadows of the Highridge.

Shadows of the Highridge is born of dual inspirations: Tremors (yes, that cult classic with Kevin Bacon) and Cry the Beloved Country (Alan Paton would probably cry anew to see this amalgamation). The principal mystery in Into the Nanten, Brin Salisir, is a secondary but vital character within Shadows of the Highridge. A standalone fantasy horror featuring intelligent, murderous worms and some very inconvenient soldiers, Shadows of the Highridge can be read on its own, but it’s also a great way to delve a little deeper into the Nanten.

It’s a short fun read, and while you’re waiting for it to download (or get shipped to you) let me know in the comments one of two things: 1) What combination of inspirations do you think made the original creators cringe to see? 2) What’s one of the weirdest things that’s ever happened to you while traveling?

Moving along the soil is the quickest way to die; for Tolly to survive she must learn to stay silent. Life on farms like hers was difficult enough in the face of plague and a decade of drought, but something worse has come to the foothills under the Highridge Mountains. Something that will destroy everything she loves.

Mere miles away, Vanig’s search for water to revive his farm is cut short when soldiers arrive bearing dark news of disaster striking farms throughout the region – and they suspect he is the root cause of it all. Those suspicions spike when a disheveled warrior appears hundreds of miles from home and takes Vanig hostage.

Death looms in the shadows of the Highridge.

Enjoy an excerpt:

Tolly had never run so hard. The house was so far off. How could she make it?

The certainty grew within her: Time was short. Why was she so sure? She could feel the panic rise.

“Tolly!” Nym was chasing her. “Come back!”

No, she thought. Bring them this way! But her lungs were already burning. She couldn’t yell any more. All she could do was run. Please, Nym, just listen.

“Little sister!” A Truan hand heard the commotion and came running from the other side of the house. “Little sister, stop! Kanda says it is not safe!”

Get out of my way, she wanted to yell. Run with me. But all of her air was spent on sprinting. The man was closing on her. She would have to dodge him somehow. She couldn’t let him stop her. He was ten feet away. Then the ground exploded beneath him.

Tolly fell, skidding to a halt as her skirts flew up around her. Scrapes burned along her thighs and up her backside. She heard screams behind her. The dust obscured her view. And then, through falling earth, she saw half of the Truan’s body thrown into the air by a tower of dirt.

No, not dirt, it was living. A snake. A worm. The monster was thicker than ten men standing together and jutted out of the ground twice as high. Three massive jawbones worked separately to hold the torso of the Truan in place. Whatever was happening within the mouth, Tolly didn’t want to see it.

About the Author:

Jay Swanson is the creator of Into the Nanten, the world’s first real-time fantasy blog. He is also author of a spin-off novel, Shadows of the Highridge, the standalone short novel Dark Horse, and the Vitalis Chronicles trilogy. Jay grew up in Washington State, and has lived all over the world since then. Jay served for three years with Mercy Ships, a medical charity that runs the world’s largest private hospital ship, the Africa Mercy. In each country they visit, Mercy Ships donates free surgeries to the world’s forgotten poor, alleviating the suffering that so often accompanies a lack of access to medical care. He started in IT, then worked as the editor for their international Creative Pool, and finished as the on board Media Liason.

Paris will always have a place in Jay’s heart; he lived in France for two years, but he’s currently working in the US as a consultant on electronic medical records. Basically, he lives on planes.

Jay has a background in design and video production which have been instrumental in his self-publishing endeavors. Jay was telling stories from an early age, and latched on to video as soon as he discovered he could borrow people’s cameras. The stories that would one day become the Vitalis Chronicles began to take form in Jay’s head as movie ideas while he was still in college, and he began writing them down when he realized that they might make good books as well as films (and that if he died in Africa, there would be nothing left to prove they ever existed). He started writing White Shores in May of 2010 and finished on Christmas day of that year in Applesbosch, South Africa.

Website: http://jayswanson.me/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/jay.swanson.author
Twitter: https://twitter.com/jayonaboat
Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/27203157-shadows-of-the-highridge

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Whiskey Devils by Brandon Zenner

This post is part of a virtual book tour organized by Goddess Fish Promotions. Brandon will be awarding a $20 Amazon or B/N GC to a randomly drawn winner via rafflecopter during the tour. Click on the tour banner to see the other stops on the tour.

Evan Powers has become the new manager in Nick Grady’s well-established marijuana growing operation. Led by his roommate and best friend, little has changed in Nick’s secretive business since the late ‘60s, which is just the way the aging hippie would for like it to remain. However, Nick’s complex past comes full circle, thrusting Evan in a scramble to decipher the truth behind the enigmatic lives of the people he holds dear. Deep in the woods, demons will be unleashed.

Enjoy an excerpt:

We walked directly across the hall, to a second door leading to a second warehouse. It was like those Russian Matryoshka dolls that get pulled apart to reveal smaller dolls nesting inside. A warehouse within a warehouse.

Nick took me to the door and knocked.

My previous work took place down the long hall to the left, in a room around the corner in the rear of the building, and I looked over my shoulder to where I normally worked with Becka. She was nowhere to be seen. Whatever Nick was about to show me was entirely new, but I had a very good idea of exactly what was behind that thick door.

A sliding viewing port opened, and a set of eyes looked out. The viewing port closed, and the sound of a heavy lock clacked from the hollows of the metal door. A moment later it opened and we stepped inside, shielding our eyes from the glaring light.

“Holy hell,” I muttered, stepping into the room. The temperature was hot in there, muggy, and my eyes were practically blinded from the succession of thousand-watt high pressure sodium light bulbs lining the ceiling. A sea of tall marijuana plants filled the room, all set in carefully arranged rows, some attached to an elaborate hydroponic system. The smell of fresh marijuana was as thick as soup. A silver tray holding orange slices and a knife sat on a table by the door.

“So.” I turned to Nick. “What exactly do you need me to do?”

About the Author:

Brandon Zenner is an American fiction writer. His short fiction has been published in both print and online publications, the first being submitted when he was just 19 years old. THE EXPERIMENT OF DREAMS, his debut eBook thriller, has reached Amazon's top-ten charts within its genre many times. His categories of choice are thrillers, dystopian, crime, and science fiction.

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Let's Stalk Rex Jupiter by Allison A. Spector - Guest Blog and Giveaway

This post is part of a virtual book tour organized by Goddess Fish Promotions. Allison Spector will be awarding a signed copy of book with original plot outline notes (loose sheets of paper) inside and additional notes at end or in margins of story (US/Canada only) to a randomly drawn winner via rafflecopter during the tour. Click on the tour banner to see the other stops on the tour.

Five Things You’d Probably Never Guess about Allison A. Spector

The fun part about being a writer, and participating in blog tours, is that you get these opportunities to plumb the depths of your soul and share random flotsam and jetsam about your Inner Being. It’s really an intriguing exercise, and leads to an extraordinary amount of navel-gazing.

Well, my navel is ready to be gazed (lint and all). So per the request of my lovely and talented hosts at It's Raining Books, here are five fun-facts for current and future (readers, lovers, haters, neutral-ers, analysts, over-analysts, browsers and grazers) of my work.

These revelations have been provided haphazardly, in no particular order:

1) I’m an extrovert, but I live in my head

These things may sound contradictory but it’s true. I’m a genuine extrovert. I love parties, social gatherings, dancing, and generally keeping company with other human beings. It energizes me, and makes me feel refreshed. And yet I’m pretty much always deep in thought, running social algorithms, daydreaming. My exterior is just a means to an end—a jar for my brain to play in, pulling levers and pressing buttons to move my ungainly form point-to-point. I give a speech. I twirl. I laugh. But I take my home with me, peering out the curtains of my eyes as I interact with the big wide world.

2) I’m an energy policy geek

My greatest dream in my college years was to get into political management and spin-doctoring, (sweet naïve thing that I was.) So I found a job in DC after I graduated and served as an advocate for a decent environmental cause. I’m pretty good at building bridges and giving impassioned speeches so it worked out for me. But I soon learned that not everyone wants to build bridges. So over the years, I’ve moved further and further into program development and policy analysis and finding ways to get people to work together in the formation of meaningful, nuanced partnerships that are good for the Earth and support sound business principles. Yup, I am a total People, Profits, Planet geek. And I love every minute of it!

3) I am a lucid, sensory dreamer

For as long as I can remember, I have been able to interact with my dreamscapes. I find myself wandering the same locations over and over. I have entire imaginary campuses, and city blocks mapped out in my mind, that I explore at leisure in my subconscious. And since I usually know I’m dreaming, it allows me to “test play” story concepts and work out spiritual and emotional conundrums. It’s an awesome tool to have as a writer. Strangely, however, I struggle greatly to mentally picture and/or form tangible images in my mind during waking hours so I’m an extremely poor visual artist.

4) I try not to eat smart, cute animals

I remember vividly in middle school I had a rather young and idealistic health teacher tell the class that one day we would all realize that eating meat was wrong. The words stuck with me until this very day. Ultimately, I developed a personal philosophy that leads to me avoid meat in general, although I don’t really have any major problem with dairy as long as the animals are treated in a humane manner. However I do have a dietary code that I stick to do matter what, and it goes as follows:

(1) I won’t eat mammals. They are fuzzy, complex, and have mothers.

(2) I won’t eat anything that is capable of problem-solving and/or emotions.

Pretty much anything else is food. So fish and chicken are sometimes on the menu. But never pigs or squids. This can end up being quasi arbitrary, but it’s my compromise with The Universe (and or my middle-school health teacher).

5) I totally invented cake-pie!

It was back in the summer of 2011. I was 38 weeks pregnant, and ready to give birth like you wouldn’t believe. It was days away from my husband’s birthday. I was feeling exhausted and didn’t have anything to give him. All I could think about was f-o-o-o-d!

There was this awesome cake shop in the town were we lived. It is called Barbs Pies and Pastries in Ferndale, WA. Barb and her team are amazingly talented people. I called and told her I wanted to commission a New Kind of Dessert for my husband. Something that had never been done before. They offered some suggestions of the different types of cakes and pies they were capable of making. But my hungry, pregnant brain was not satisfied.

So I said the words that would change the course of culinary history…forever. “Can you combine cake and pie together? Like, you know, into a CAKE PIE?” Barb was intrigued. She began to talk through the structure such a creation would require in order to maximize both stability and deliciousness.

The work she made was so delicious and amazing that the gods wept tears of happiness. Or at least, I did cause it was super tasty and amazing. My husband was absolutely thrilled and felt very loved that someone cared about him enough to commission a special dessert just for him.

From there, folks started hearing about Cake Pie and requesting them for themselves.

So, let it be known, oh great Internet. Cake Pie (what is now known as pie-cake, or pie-caken)was originally commissioned by Allison Spector, as a love letter to her husband, Charles Van Zee.

And was created by the amazing and talented Barb’s Pies and Pastries.

Thanks again for the opportunity to post some fun facts about myself. This has been a ton of fun to write. For more zaniness and hijinks be sure to check out my novella, Let’s Stalk Rex Jupiter! And also, check out the other fine books available through 1888.center and Black Hill Press!

Trouble’s brewing in the Evergreen Jungle. When controversial author Rex Jupiter plans a visit to a Bellingham bookstore, news of his arrival attracts the attention of the mysterious Paladin, who plans on leading a mob of rioting housewives against him. But the Paladin has competition. Sleuth-extraordinaire Marian Krause has her own bone to pick with Jupiter as she scrambles to solve the death of a woman who has stolen her identity. Rex may think he has the situation under control, but when the wrath of the local Druids is incurred, pitchforks and torches may be the least of his concerns.

Enjoy an excerpt:

The Paladin knew just where to go. The Shipment had arrived an hour beforehand if his Intelligence was to be trusted. It could be. His Sources never failed him. He was sure the payload would be kept in the stockroom before it was added into the inventory. And he was correct.

The Paladin grabbed a box cutter from the pocket of his cape. It was hard to see in the dark and the eyeholes of his Guy Fawkes mask were too small, but these were mere trifles. Soon, dozens of the Heretic’s novels of Shameful Smarm would be loaded into his bag and artfully recycled in a socially responsible manner. No longer would readers be burned by the white-hot radioactivity of the inflammatory passages he knew lurked within those covers.

Passages housed within chapter titles like "How to Fan a Flame War," “White Privilege Rocks!," and “I Objectified Your Mama (and She Loved it).”

Whether the appropriations of the tools of troll-dom were ironic or non-ironic, it mattered little to the Paladin. The only thing that mattered was that he would soon be the agent through which a great Cultural Transformation would take place. And a glorious new age would dawn…

Or something like that.

But for now, he would start small. Yes, for now, he would have to be satisfied that the five hideous cardboard cut-outs of the arrogant, smirking Rex Jupiter would be hacked to—no, wait! Only four would be shredded. On the fifth, he would draw devil horns and a twirly moustache with, dare he imagine it, Permanent Marker.

About the Author:

Allison Spector was born and raised in the hedonistic playground of the Jersey Shore, but finds herself oddly allergic to spray tan. She is a proud graduate of Goucher College, and started her environmentally-focused career in Washington DC in 2005. She moved to the Pacific Northwest in 2008, and fell in love with its beauty and people. Allison is currently on a Midwestern Adventure and is determined to live as much life as possible—to accomplish her dreams one at a time—and to nurture her loving family, and blaze a trail of wit, whimsy, and eccentricity wherever she goes.

Twitter: https://twitter.com/inspectorallie
Website: http://www.allisonspector.com
Buy the book at Amazon.

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